I found this book eminently readable and I am full of admiration of the strength and resilience of sailors in coping with the adversity flung at them by nature. I now need to research who were the convicts allocated to Flinders. ( )

Mundle's book on Flinders is a fairly dry read of his achievements. However, this alone provides a compelling description of his significant role in forming Australia's identity after European settlement in name and border. ( )

The name of Matthew Flinders is relatively well known in Australia because of his circumnavigation of Australia, his role in naming the land mass, and because of a few landmarks that bear his name.
Rob Mundle has written a very informative biography of Flinders. That he is a sailor of some reputation is obvious by his close attention to the details of the ship, the rigging, navigation and crew. A historian would in most cases overlook the relevance of these. But not being written by a historian, the book does lack the usual reference to source material.
New facts for me were the reasons why Flinders was imprisoned for many years on a small island in the Indian Ocean. And that two Frenchmen that continue to have major landmarks named after them were spying on the young colony of New South Wales.
I missed much of a discussion of his legacy, and even his funeral is not mentioned.
However, a very interesting book of one of the most influential explorers in history, ( )

Engrossing ( )